We'd still have to manufacture the hardware, and boost it up there. That has a pretty high cost - assuming we are willing to do it.
Not disagreeing, just playing devil's advocate. In the interim, wouldn't it be a good thing if we polished the technology here on earth by refining solar cell tech, (testing it by distribution works well, no?), working with the technology to move power wirelessly over large distances, where we can do it more cheaply? And pour money into lowering launch costs? (Launch costs are the deal breaker...)
How to decommission a space based reflector ? Switch the thing off. Done. For extra good measure, fit a booster rocket to it, so we can fire it off into deep space once we're done with it.
Why? Unless it's very badly damaged, or really obsolete, just fix or upgrade the thing. Surely that must be better than trashing hundreds of billions of dollars worth of investment.
One nice side effect of lowering launch costs as far as we'd have to in order to build orbiting solar power arrays, would be that we could take all that nasty nuclear waste and put it somewhere where we don't have to deal with it (somewhere on the moon, Heinlein had a point - future generations might find those heavy radioactives useful, and the delta V isn't that much, compared to other schemes like dropping it into the sun...);)
Actually, the receiving station would make some RF noise - from the transformers converting the power to whatever is available. The receiving station would also likely be larger than a battery... making it vulnerable to detection.
But it's a good damned idea, if you are fighting people who can't destroy your power satellites. Unfortunately launch capability to GEO, or anywhere else that we could place those power satellites, isn't really that hard to do anymore. (Don't have to launch an explosive warhead, either...)
Drake and Pournelle and other SF writers worked thru all the countermeasures to this decades ago:)
increased concentrations of directed microwave emissions
You mean like radar?
But it's likely that any genetic effects will be masked by the plethora of other mutagens in our environment. So likely we won't know for many generations, yet. If ever.
Now in the "adult" world (it disappoints me that many adult are overgrown children), I know ADD is real because I'm certainly smart enough to write code that implements business rules, but I often lose track of important conversations. I constantly end up asking not for clarification of a topic, but just to hear things restated verbatim because the words went in one ear and out the other.
In my experience,that's not ADD. That's being in a useless, mindless, endless job, mostly populated by coworkers who feel about the same way about it, even if they can't even determine that for themselves.
Get out, while you can. You still can; the fact that you can talk about it that way, means you still have something of yourself left.
There is no such thing as the "adult world". There is only people who do their job, people who don't, people who you respect, and people you don't. Life is a bit more complicated than that, but in that position, it's about the best way to look at it that will get you out to somewhere you can find some self respect. Make the leap. It's not a very comfortable world, and you'll be challenged by it, but you won't want to go back to being beholden by people who can't think past their next promotion.
It reminds me of an old saying: "There are no adult dogs; just old, trained puppies."
Our society - our global society, not just here in the US - needs more people who think for themselves. People who think for themselves are the ones who change the world.
The summary imples that the US has given scientology religious status. The US does not recognise or give religions status.
I realize you're not an us resident, but if you have been following anything that happens in this country, and especially over the last 9 years, you should realize the irony there.
Our Constitution says we shouldn't give religion special status when it comes to secular powers. The reality is, and has been over the course of our history, quite different.
The Bush administration was hardly the first to ignore that clause, but it can be argued that it was the most damaging government we ever had in that respect...
It can be argued that in some ways we have been *too* permissive of people who can damage our society...
(I'm not disagreeing with you, just pointing out that if we can't even have a common definition for the ability to take care of oneself, then, well... frak. If one takes that concept far enough, we should all be in asylums, which point has been alluded to many times in history;)
In many places, there are laws regarding the safety of a product and its fitness to perform the function for which it was purchased
One could make very much the same sort of generalization about sin, with the difference that the payment one makes to avoid it doesn't have to be in monetary terms, but can still be just as damaging.
Sorry, but I'm one of those compleat heretics who thinks that any form of religion is silly, primitive superstition. I use the term atheist for myself only because it's the closest terminology in the common language I've found for what I don't believe in;)
(There's something to be said for having a bent sense of humor, as well. It's a modern survival mechanism...)
A friend of mine recently had a pair of Mormons come to his front door and ask to talk to him about the Bible. He, a confirmed nonbeliever, told them he was willing to talk to them... for fifty bucks. Completely calmly, they replied that they couldn't give him money, but if he needed some help with something -- say, the garbage taken out, or the dishes cleaned up, or some furniture moved, or something -- then they would happy to help him with that first, and one of them could make coffee to drink during the talk, too.
While I do agree with you that many people who are christians - perhaps most - do really believe in what they say, and act accordingly, I also have to put forth a modern adage in response to this, to wit:
Well, we could just build a wall all along our southern border. A tall concrete wall, with barbed wire, etc. Guard towers every few hundred feet, searchlights, machine gun nets, etc, etc...
That would keep the undesirable elements out, right? Right?
Then we could built one on our northern border, as well.
And around the ports on our coasts.
And airports. And every entry into the US. "Papers, please." - forget the Please.
And forget the lesson that history has taught us, that repressive empires tend to fall from within.
For all our technology, all our hype about the superiority of our government system, we have learned NOTHING.
In another few hundred years - perhaps sooner - the United States of America, Give us your poor, your hungry, etc... is going to be just another footnote in history books.
Just like every other system of government in history that started off with good intentions, we have deteriorated to being run by rich people with no scruples whatsoever.
WE ARE NOT SPECIAL.
Although, we might get noted, in those history books, as being the most potentially - ? - repressive government in human history, if we keep going in the direction we are.
I guess we can hope that the best mention we may have in those history books, is as an object lesson in the WORST uses of technology.
Well, we can hope that those history books will mention that. Depends on who writes them.
I've had many an opportunity to eat rattlesnake - rather common out here.
You are right in that the texture and look are like chicken, if cooked similar.
I've had a different experience with the taste, tho.
Rattlesnake meat doesn't taste like *store-bought* chicken (which doesn't have much taste, anyway). But it does taste a lot like fresh free-range chicken. Not surprising, closer food chain association.
As to the snake oil problem - try barbecue over an open fire on a wood skewer. Let it drip. The end result is very much like good, fresh free-range chicken, barbecued over an open fire.;)
(I first tasted free-range chicken a few years ago and will never go back to that store bought crap; makes me nauseated now. Tastes spoiled. My first thought on tasting free-range chicken was "hey, this tastes just like fire roasted rattlesnake!")
Strange... but then slow-roasting any meat over an open fire always tastes a helluva lot better than boiling/simmering/oven does.;)
I'll pass on your suggestions about cats and dogs. I prefer not to eat meat that comes from sentient mammals*. Call it what you will.
* I only rarely eat beef anymore; but I also don't consider cattle sentient. Some may have other opinions.
Lunar surface dust in a pressurized environment does. I don't remember that anyone has adequately explained it or not, but it's probably due to rapid oxidation of soil particles in an oxygenated environment. (makes sense)
Another possibility is that moondust "burns" in the lunar lander's oxygen atmosphere. "Oxygen is very reactive," notes Lofgren, "and would readily combine with the dangling chemical bonds of the moondust." The process, called oxidation, is akin to burning. Although it happens too slowly for smoke or flames, the oxidation of moondust might produce an aroma like burnt gunpowder. (Note: Burnt and unburnt gunpowder do not smell the same. Apollo astronauts were specific. Moondust smells like burnt gunpowder.)
It would probably be the only thing you *could* smell (and taste, likely), as the air rushes out of your sinuses and lungs, past the rupturing blood vessels.
The public's lack of interest in NASA has nothing to do with pop culture, it's that NASA isn't doing anything interesting anymore.
Well, isn't that fun.
We can't have public interest in NASA doing anything important if public interest isn't in NASA doing anything important.
Maybe if "the public" at large would get off it's fat lazy tv-addicted ass and start caring about something more than the fate of the latest soap characters, we might see funding for things that really matter to the human race as a whole.
Meanwhile, the people involved with NASA and all the other attempts to try and show people what a wonderful, beautiful universe it is, are wasting their time? Why don't we just disband it completely, then?
Sorry, not sniping at you. You just gave me an opening...
Slashdot Mirror
It's not that difficult to train a human, either*. Most humans don't bother ;)
* Children being the required exception to that rule.
SB
We'd still have to manufacture the hardware, and boost it up there. That has a pretty high cost - assuming we are willing to do it.
Not disagreeing, just playing devil's advocate. In the interim, wouldn't it be a good thing if we polished the technology here on earth by refining solar cell tech, (testing it by distribution works well, no?), working with the technology to move power wirelessly over large distances, where we can do it more cheaply? And pour money into lowering launch costs? (Launch costs are the deal breaker...)
How to decommission a space based reflector ? Switch the thing off. Done. For extra good measure, fit a booster rocket to it, so we can fire it off into deep space once we're done with it.
Why? Unless it's very badly damaged, or really obsolete, just fix or upgrade the thing. Surely that must be better than trashing hundreds of billions of dollars worth of investment.
One nice side effect of lowering launch costs as far as we'd have to in order to build orbiting solar power arrays, would be that we could take all that nasty nuclear waste and put it somewhere where we don't have to deal with it (somewhere on the moon, Heinlein had a point - future generations might find those heavy radioactives useful, and the delta V isn't that much, compared to other schemes like dropping it into the sun...) ;)
SB
Beautiful :)
SB
Actually, the receiving station would make some RF noise - from the transformers converting the power to whatever is available. The receiving station would also likely be larger than a battery... making it vulnerable to detection.
But it's a good damned idea, if you are fighting people who can't destroy your power satellites. Unfortunately launch capability to GEO, or anywhere else that we could place those power satellites, isn't really that hard to do anymore. (Don't have to launch an explosive warhead, either...)
Drake and Pournelle and other SF writers worked thru all the countermeasures to this decades ago :)
SB
increased concentrations of directed microwave emissions
You mean like radar?
But it's likely that any genetic effects will be masked by the plethora of other mutagens in our environment. So likely we won't know for many generations, yet. If ever.
SB
Evolution in action.
SB
Someday one of the inhabitants of that ocean is going to go back in time and kick your butt for that remark ;)
SB
Now in the "adult" world (it disappoints me that many adult are overgrown children), I know ADD is real because I'm certainly smart enough to write code that implements business rules, but I often lose track of important conversations. I constantly end up asking not for clarification of a topic, but just to hear things restated verbatim because the words went in one ear and out the other.
In my experience,that's not ADD. That's being in a useless, mindless, endless job, mostly populated by coworkers who feel about the same way about it, even if they can't even determine that for themselves.
Get out, while you can. You still can; the fact that you can talk about it that way, means you still have something of yourself left.
There is no such thing as the "adult world". There is only people who do their job, people who don't, people who you respect, and people you don't. Life is a bit more complicated than that, but in that position, it's about the best way to look at it that will get you out to somewhere you can find some self respect. Make the leap. It's not a very comfortable world, and you'll be challenged by it, but you won't want to go back to being beholden by people who can't think past their next promotion.
It reminds me of an old saying: "There are no adult dogs; just old, trained puppies."
Our society - our global society, not just here in the US - needs more people who think for themselves. People who think for themselves are the ones who change the world.
SB
Corollary: No adult too far ahead.
SB
The summary imples that the US has given scientology religious status. The US does not recognise or give religions status.
I realize you're not an us resident, but if you have been following anything that happens in this country, and especially over the last 9 years, you should realize the irony there.
Our Constitution says we shouldn't give religion special status when it comes to secular powers. The reality is, and has been over the course of our history, quite different.
The Bush administration was hardly the first to ignore that clause, but it can be argued that it was the most damaging government we ever had in that respect...
It can be argued that in some ways we have been *too* permissive of people who can damage our society...
SB
Define "medically competent". I dare you. ;)
(I'm not disagreeing with you, just pointing out that if we can't even have a common definition for the ability to take care of oneself, then, well... frak. If one takes that concept far enough, we should all be in asylums, which point has been alluded to many times in history ;)
SB
In many places, there are laws regarding the safety of a product and its fitness to perform the function for which it was purchased
One could make very much the same sort of generalization about sin, with the difference that the payment one makes to avoid it doesn't have to be in monetary terms, but can still be just as damaging.
Sorry, but I'm one of those compleat heretics who thinks that any form of religion is silly, primitive superstition. I use the term atheist for myself only because it's the closest terminology in the common language I've found for what I don't believe in ;)
(There's something to be said for having a bent sense of humor, as well. It's a modern survival mechanism...)
SB
A friend of mine recently had a pair of Mormons come to his front door and ask to talk to him about the Bible. He, a confirmed nonbeliever, told them he was willing to talk to them ... for fifty bucks. Completely calmly, they replied that they couldn't give him money, but if he needed some help with something -- say, the garbage taken out, or the dishes cleaned up, or some furniture moved, or something -- then they would happy to help him with that first, and one of them could make coffee to drink during the talk, too.
While I do agree with you that many people who are christians - perhaps most - do really believe in what they say, and act accordingly, I also have to put forth a modern adage in response to this, to wit:
The first hit is always free.
SB
Which boils down to: Humans are, for the most part, pretty gullible. Even after they reach the age of reason ;)
Well put, tho.
SB
Meanwhile, the lawyers get even richer...
SB
It's unlikely that prehistoric termites would be immune to modern pesticides. They wouldn't have had any reason to develop such an immunity...
oh, you were being facetious? ;)
SB
Well, we could just build a wall all along our southern border. A tall concrete wall, with barbed wire, etc. Guard towers every few hundred feet, searchlights, machine gun nets, etc, etc...
That would keep the undesirable elements out, right? Right?
Then we could built one on our northern border, as well.
And around the ports on our coasts.
And airports. And every entry into the US. "Papers, please." - forget the Please.
And forget the lesson that history has taught us, that repressive empires tend to fall from within.
For all our technology, all our hype about the superiority of our government system, we have learned NOTHING.
In another few hundred years - perhaps sooner - the United States of America, Give us your poor, your hungry, etc... is going to be just another footnote in history books.
Just like every other system of government in history that started off with good intentions, we have deteriorated to being run by rich people with no scruples whatsoever.
WE ARE NOT SPECIAL.
Although, we might get noted, in those history books, as being the most potentially - ? - repressive government in human history, if we keep going in the direction we are.
I guess we can hope that the best mention we may have in those history books, is as an object lesson in the WORST uses of technology.
Well, we can hope that those history books will mention that. Depends on who writes them.
SB
I've had many an opportunity to eat rattlesnake - rather common out here.
You are right in that the texture and look are like chicken, if cooked similar.
I've had a different experience with the taste, tho.
Rattlesnake meat doesn't taste like *store-bought* chicken (which doesn't have much taste, anyway). But it does taste a lot like fresh free-range chicken. Not surprising, closer food chain association.
As to the snake oil problem - try barbecue over an open fire on a wood skewer. Let it drip. The end result is very much like good, fresh free-range chicken, barbecued over an open fire. ;)
(I first tasted free-range chicken a few years ago and will never go back to that store bought crap; makes me nauseated now. Tastes spoiled. My first thought on tasting free-range chicken was "hey, this tastes just like fire roasted rattlesnake!")
Strange... but then slow-roasting any meat over an open fire always tastes a helluva lot better than boiling/simmering/oven does. ;)
I'll pass on your suggestions about cats and dogs. I prefer not to eat meat that comes from sentient mammals*. Call it what you will.
* I only rarely eat beef anymore; but I also don't consider cattle sentient. Some may have other opinions.
SB
As long as you continue to pay your air tax...
SB
Lunar surface dust in a pressurized environment does. I don't remember that anyone has adequately explained it or not, but it's probably due to rapid oxidation of soil particles in an oxygenated environment. (makes sense)
Looking around, I found an interesting link here
http://www.nasa.gov/exploration/home/30jan_smellofmoondust.html
Another possibility is that moondust "burns" in the lunar lander's oxygen atmosphere. "Oxygen is very reactive," notes Lofgren, "and would readily combine with the dangling chemical bonds of the moondust." The process, called oxidation, is akin to burning. Although it happens too slowly for smoke or flames, the oxidation of moondust might produce an aroma like burnt gunpowder. (Note: Burnt and unburnt gunpowder do not smell the same. Apollo astronauts were specific. Moondust smells like burnt gunpowder.)
SB
It would probably be the only thing you *could* smell (and taste, likely), as the air rushes out of your sinuses and lungs, past the rupturing blood vessels.
Briefly.
SB
Torrents don't guarantee longevity.
Multiple copies, perhaps.
Given the server space available on the web, tho, peer sharing is the best way to preserve things.
Five years ago it wouldn't have been true. It is now.
Times'changin'
Storage is getting cheaper by an order of magnitude every couple years, and bandwidth is a close second.
The best long term strategy for storage of *all* info on the web is the distribtud model.
SB
No, hoarding is good when it comes to information.
If enough people do it, we have multiple backups. Might be an absolute bitch to consolidate and recover them, but at least they are there.
Save everything. Download everything you can. Burn it..and store it.
The more people who do so, the more archives we have. Not so much different, really, than multiple monks copying multiple texts.
That, children, is the ultimate reason why lifetime+ copyright is a bad damned idea.
The more information stored in as many formats as possible, the less likely it'll be that we'll lose it in the long term.
Our society has lost sight of what's important for what's profitable.
We are lost.
SB
The public's lack of interest in NASA has nothing to do with pop culture, it's that NASA isn't doing anything interesting anymore.
Well, isn't that fun.
We can't have public interest in NASA doing anything important if public interest isn't in NASA doing anything important.
Maybe if "the public" at large would get off it's fat lazy tv-addicted ass and start caring about something more than the fate of the latest soap characters, we might see funding for things that really matter to the human race as a whole.
Meanwhile, the people involved with NASA and all the other attempts to try and show people what a wonderful, beautiful universe it is, are wasting their time? Why don't we just disband it completely, then?
Sorry, not sniping at you. You just gave me an opening...
SB
You forgot how it all moves in a clockwise direction.